• Embed Doc
  • Copy Link
  • Readcast
  • Collections
  • CommentGo Back
Download
 
Christopher BrownDr. Eileen GregoryLiterary Studies I: Lyric14 November 2007
Bibliography
 
Collected Poetry
 
Auden, Wystan Hugh.
Collected Poems
. Ed. Edward Mendelson. New York: Modern Library,2007.
 
 Biography
 
Carpenter, Humphrey.
W. H. Auden, A Biography
. Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1981.
 
Critical Books
 
Callan, Edward.
 Auden: A Carnival of Intellect 
. New York: Oxford U P, 1983.Callan contends that Auden rejected Romanticism’s mistaken presuppositions in favor of a“Christian regard for the unity and coinherence of nature and spirit” (ix). To this end, Callandemonstrates Auden’s subtle Christian compassion and regard for humanity by revealing hisanalytical tendencies and cognizance of human desire in his poetry and plays. The carnival,Callan quotes Auden, “celebrates the unity of our human race as mortal creatures” (64); it is thisconcern for human unification and humble perspective that Callan commends in Auden. Hefocuses on Auden’s longer lyrics and dramatic works, claiming that “a poet’s intellectualconcerns may be more readily apparent” in such works (viii), but he does not entirely neglect theshorter lyrics. His inquiry into Auden’s anti-Romanticism explains what set Auden apart fromhis contemporary fellow-poets, especially T. S. Eliot and W. B. Yeats.McDiarmid, Lucy.
 Auden’s Apologies for Poetry
. Princeton: Princeton U P, 1990.McDiarmid conveys Auden’s self-deprecating humility and unpretending attitude as a poet bydemonstrating his love for light verse and honesty. Like the tumbler in “The Ballad of Barnaby,”Auden acts on his talent, and writes poetry because it is his forte. He does not expect poetry to dothe grand things that Eliot and other expect of it, but writes always in humble apology, simplydoing his best. McDiarmid’s humble criticism (she begins, “Auden’s work is more importantthan anything I can say about it” [ix]) of Auden’s humble poetry is a refreshingly unpretentiousinterpretation of Auden’s resolution to what might be his most pressing concern—that poetrymakes nothing happen.Mendelson, Edward.
 Early Auden
. Cambridge MA: Harvard U P, 1983.Mendelson depicts Auden’s midlife arrival at authenticity and honesty through a series of dichotomies and their resolutions. The first is Auden’s preference for efficiency over aesthetics,rejecting superficial beauty. Second is the choice of the “art of civil responsibility” over the “artof inner vision,” illustrating the responsibility of the poet to interact with reality (xvi). Third isthe “merging” of civil and vatic poetry; rejecting both fairytale myth and over-practical civil
 
Brown 2 poetry, Auden combines vatic myth with the civil hero’s quest for self-fulfillment in harmonywith the modern mood of jejune despair. As Auden travels to America and
 Early Auden
ends,these all culminate in Auden’s anti-modernism—rejecting modernity’s ambiguity and“deception” in favor of disenchantment and truth (xxiii). Delineating how Auden’s influencesand experiences all fit together to form him as a poet, Mendelson provides a truly comprehensiveoverview of Auden’s early poetry.Replogle, Justin.
 Auden’s Poetry
. London: U of Washington P, 1969.Replogle traces two themes in this book, focusing on the speakers in Auden’s poetry. The first isAuden’s individualism, sparked by his isolation, which brought him to realize the unavoidableneed to choose and to act as an individual in society. This connection follows from the influencesof Marx (whose dialecticism necessitates choice) and Freud. The second theme is the juxtaposition of Auden’s speakers as a “Poet” and an “Antipoet” who appear in varying ratios inevery poem. The difference between these two speakers is best summed up as that betweenliteral and ironic, or between infallible bard and humble self-critic. Considering those twospeakers, Replogle lends insight into the variety of voices in Auden’s poetry, which aids incomprehending Auden’s ever-present irony.Spears, Monroe K.
The Poetry of W. H. Auden: The Disenchanted Island 
. New York: Oxford UP, 1962.Spears proclaims that he has “refrained from propounding any single thesis” (339) and that hisintent is instead to “provide the background and context required for a full appreciation of his poetry” (v). But beyond this, the reader can observe Spears’ emphasis on Auden’s religiousstanding, as he considers Auden’s conversion to be the turning point between poetry that is in“constant flux” and the subsequent stable, surer poetry (156). Because the book was writteneleven years before Auden’s death, it does not have the fullest perspective, and while a morespecific thesis might have strengthened its focus, it does reveal the change in Auden’s poetrythrough his conversion.
 
Critical Articles
 
Auden, Wystan Hugh. “The Poet & The City.”
The Dyer’s Hand and Other Essays.
New York:Random House, 1962. 72-89.Auden posits that the role of the poet is to enlighten the “Management” (those in power) of the plight and humanity of the “managed” (88), despite several inescapable traits of the poet thatdistance him from the public. Even though poetry has become one of the “pure” (materiallysuperfluous) arts and rendered the poet gratuitous (75), the poet ought to present the public andthe administration with his uniquely distanced and truthful perspective of reality. Auden’sexposition of the debt of the poet to the public, and thus, his role in the city, displays an anti-elitist attitude not often associated with Auden (89).Auden, Wystan Hugh. “Postscript: Christianity & Art.”
The Dyer’s Hand and Other Essays
. New York: Random House, 1962. 456-461.Auden enumerates the difficulties encountered by an artist who is also a Christian, the foremostof which is that “[t]here can no more be a ‘Christian’ art than … a Christian diet” (458). This is partly because to imply a culture (which denotes secularism) of Christianity is sacrilegious,
 
Brown 3 partly because “it is impossible to represent Christ on the stage” (457), and partly due to the factthat in a love poem it is not the recipient of love that is glorified, but the love itself. Thus in poems like Donne’s and Hopkins’s, the name of Christ could easily be replaced with “Buddha”in the spirit of poetry, but not in the spirit of Christianity. The essay helpfully delineates Auden’sview of the poet in relation to Christianity and God, and explains many of his unconventionalattitudes toward his religion.Auden, Wystan Hugh. “Psychology and Art To-day.”
The English Auden
. Ed. EdwardMendelson. New York: Random House, Inc., 1977. 332-342.Auden explicates Freud’s theory of basic human psychology: that man is subconsciously drivento create, and that the act of creation is basically cathartic—an unintentional external resolutionof inner turmoil. This is pertinent because it applies also to his contemporaries, who, because of Freud, had a heightened awareness of dreams, relations, instincts, and “hero-worship” (342). Theessay sheds light on Auden’s Freudian influence, illuminating his later belief that all poetryserves as either “escape-art” or “parable-art” (342), as well as his fascination with the teachingsof Homer Lane.Auden, Wystan Hugh. “Writing.”
The Dyer’s Hand and Other Essays
. New York: RandomHouse, 1962. 13-27.Here Auden provides reflections on the role of the poet, the nature of poetry, and the act of creation, by means of aphorisms just as varied and wide-ranging as the ruminations in the essay.These are a few of the most pertinent: the poet must be, above all things, authentic and honest; poetry’s most glorious aspect is that its medium is the common tongue; its “ulterior purpose” is,“by telling the truth, to disenchant and disintoxicate” (27); poetry is not a fluid outpouring of the poet’s subconscious (16) nor is it effortless and mechanic (17); finally, one of Auden’s mostintriguing and paradoxical beliefs, poetry does not do anything (27). Although a single argumentis hard to tease out of these short paragraphs, the ideas aid in understanding Auden’s definitionof the poet and the act of writing poetry.Bayley, John. “W. H. Auden.”
The Romantic Survival: A Study in Poetic Evolution
. London:Constable & Co., Ltd., 1957. Repr.
 Auden: A Collection of Critical Essays
. Ed. MonroeK. Spears. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall, 1964. 60-80.Bayley traces Auden’s struggle to close the distance between art and life, especially in theinclination of poetry to invoke a world of “magic” completely disparate from the real world.Auden is “obsessed with the difference between” the two sides of art, “parable-art” and “escape-art” (75), and strives to keep his poetry from falling into a mythic disconnection from reality. Hefirst accomplishes this engagement with the real by means of Yeatsian adolescent physicality, but, finding that insufficient, he employs, more generally, “vivid personal apprehensions of things” (79). Bayley highlights Auden’s talent at revealing the “spectacle of things and people intheir medium of isolation,” explaining how that effect was his utmost goal (80), not the magicthat his poetry effortlessly and unintentionally invokes (74).Bucknell, Katherine. Introduction.
 Juvenilia: Poems 1922-1928
. Ed. Katherine Bucknell.Princeton: Princeton U P, 2003. xix-lii.Bucknell summarizes Auden’s earliest influences—his practices of imitation and assimilation,along with his feelings of isolation and insecurity—and proffers two insightful comments. The
of 00

Leave a Comment

You must be to leave a comment.
Submit
Characters: ...
You must be to leave a comment.
Submit
Characters: ...